More Fall Festival Happenings!

Chris here with more news for the fall festivals! We're counting down the days until Nathaniel and I are in Toronto, and TIFF just announced all of their Canadian titles to be seen at the festival. Most notorious among them is the delayed Xavier Dolan film The Death and Life of John F. Donovan, which will be a world premiere. Producers had previously noted that the film would be likely for the fall fests, but it's post-production woes made those comments a bit in flux. Regardless, we are very curious to see Dolan's first English language effort and his bursting cast that includes Jacob Tremblay, Natalie Portman, and Kit Harrington (but not Jessica Chastain, left to the cutting room floor).

Another noteworthy announcement is that the New York Film Festival has chosen its closing film: Julian Schnabel's Venice-bound Van Gogh biopic starring Willem Dafoe At Eternity's Gate. The film joins that fest's opening night The Favourite and centerpiece Roma, which will each play other festivals. It had been unclear in the past few months if the film would be released in time for the 20189 Oscar season but CBS films looks to open the film in November. Can we bank on Dafoe as one of our Best Actor sure things this year? And could Schnabel return after The Diving Bell and the Butterfly got so close to Oscar?

Cate Blanchett to play Marina Abramovic.... sort of

by Murtada

Do you watch Documentary Now? It’s a parody of documentaries on the IFC TV channel. It's also very funny and note perfect. At least according to several friends who chimed in when I asked the question about it on twitter. The show's stars Fred Armisen and Bill Hader (who are also the executive producers) and it’s hosted by Dame Helen Mirren. Now they’ve got another Oscar-winning actress who has been a British royal onscreen to guest star in an upcoming episode: Cate Blanchett.

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Beauty Break: "Crazy Rich Asians" Covers THR

Chris here. While August is usually a slow winding down of the summer movie season into unfortunateness, one of this summer's most anticipated is still to come: hit lit adaptation Crazy Rich Asians! We fans of Kevin Kwan's extended family book series already know why you should be very excited about this Jane Austen-esque delight, but allow me to quickly illuminate you what's in store: an ever rare romantic comedy, set in the glamorous and opulent lifestyle of the filthy rich, and most crucially, the first American studio film led by an Asian American cast in decades.

The film is currently sitting poolside on the cover of The Hollywood Reporter, which gives us a moment to luxuriate in its gloriousness...

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Cabaret Pt 1: 'You have to understand the way I am, mein herr.'

Three-Part Mini-Series
Occasionally we'll take a movie and baton pass it around the team and really dive in. If you missed past installments we've gone long and deep on Rebecca (1940), Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (1966),  Rosemary's Baby (1968), Silence of the Lambs (1991), Thelma & Louise (1991), and A League of Their Own (1992). Now... Bob Fosse's Cabaret (1972) which is showing this weekend at the Quad Cinema in NYC - Editor

Team Experience is proud to present a three-part retrospective deep dive into Bob Fosse's Cabaret (1972), winner of 8 Oscars, and one of the most singular films ever made. Though it takes place on a stage it's entirely cinematic in a way many film musicals --even the ones that don't involve actual stages -- ever even think to be.

Part 1 by Nathaniel R

00:01 Cabaret begins in total silence with white text credits on a black screen. Countless movies begin this way, but not musicals. There is no bright and colorful title card, no overture to prep you for its famous song score. Cabaret takes place at the dead end of the Weimar era in Germany, and emerged onscreen at the dead end of the musical genre's dominance of movie culture. This is not lost on the genius dancer/choreographer turned film director Bob Fosse, who throws us immediately into a dark and dingy underworld... as if we've already eaten pomegranate seeds and sealed our fate...

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Soundtracking: "Shame"

by Chris Feil

There is reinvention of a golden standard and then there is what Shame does with “New York, New York”. Carey Mulligan’s Sissy interrupts the life her sex addict brother Brandon, played by Michael Fassbender, initiating his decent into rock bottom. But when he goes to see her perform in some anonymously upscale bar, her rendition of Frank Sinatra’s musical calling card similarly halts the film’s syncopated rhythms. Sparsely orchestrated, Sissy goes off-melody and off-tradition, singing an unexpectedly fragile version that McQueen uses to link the emotional brokenness between siblings. Decidedly not the triumph we are used to hearing in a Sinatra horn section...

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